A very old case, I only remember seeing bits and pieces of the original segment on UM.

Christi was a 22 year old woman, who disappeared from Gothenburg, Lincoln County, Nebraska on Dec. 11, 1987. On the original segment, if I remember correctly, they interviewed her husband Mark who 'had no clue why she'd abandon her family'. Suspicion soon fell on him as details of their stormy/abusive marriage were unearthed.


To this day her body has never been found, but as of 10/11/06 (the date of Link #2), the case is still maintained as a homicide by the Gothenburg Police Department and Nebraska State Patrol.

Information via the Web is pretty scarce, but I did manage to scrape up two links and emailed the webmaster of a small North Platte newspaper concerning another link (that isn't currently working).





Link #1--Scroll down a bit (http://nebraska.statepaper.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2004/08/14/41198a15960f4)
Unsolved Case Gets Grant Aid (http://www.gothenburgtimes.com/vnews/display.v/ART/2006/10/07/452596baaa73a)

Thanks for posting that Huskerz.....:)

I wonder if there's a chance Mark Nichols will be arrested since they found blood at their house. I know its a long shot since its not out of the ordinary for your blood to be in your own home but I certainly hope he can be brought to justice because I think he killed Christi. Wow thats something to think she would be a grandma now.

If they can link Mark Nichols to the DNA somehow......they could arrest him, if only on circumstantial evidence.

(Same thing is going on in Omaha right now.......a guy murders his g/f.......huge amts of blood/DNA found all over his room, yet no body has been found)

This is just speculation on my part, but I feel like a lot of people still operate under the assumption that if there is no body, there is no crime. Thankfully, that's not the case today, although many prosecutors still need to recognize this, at least in my opinion. There are so many details in the Christi Nichols case that makes me think her husband did it.

Aside from the blood, there is the fact that he was able to name EVERY bit of clothing that was missing from her closet... almost like he took the clothes out of the closet himself. I'm sorry if I'm generalizing here, but I've had a few live-in boyfriends during my life and I doubt if any of them could tell authorities what clothes I had taken had I disappeared.

Yes finding the blood that was Christi's is a plus in terms of a criminal case. However it still would be far from a for sure conviction. I think if her body was ever found that you would see Mark Nichols arrested within hours. I think it would be possible to get a conviction based on the little physical evidence there is. However I think they are afraid he might get acquitted and that new evidence would come up later hence why he has not been charged as of this date. Hell I think it is to the point I think people would even be willing to let him plead down to a lesser charge if he would just tell where the body was and stuff.

If a DNA match is ever made.......I think it'd be kind of hard to acquit Mark Nichols of murder.....it would just confirm what rumors there were about his abusive past.

I think if her body was ever found that you would see Mark Nichols arrested within hours. I think it would be possible to get a conviction based on the little physical evidence there is. However I think they are afraid he might get acquitted and that new evidence would come up later hence why he has not been charged as of this date.

I agree. I'm sure the cops and district attorney have the double jeopardy laws in mind; once a person is acquitted in the court of law, he or she cannot be retried for that same crime, even if new evidence comes to light. Therefore, until the cops can come up with more evidence, they don't want to charge him (or anyone else) in Christi's case.

Yes Kane and someone above said that if Nichols could be connected by DNA that it for sure would clinch it. But not so fast. Most of the time it would clinch it but there are so many factors in someone getting convicted. I have seen cases where there was enough circumstancial evidence and yet a person got acquitted not because the jurors didnt think they did it but because either the prosecutor did a lousy job presenting the case and being convicing or just because there was not enough evidence to erase doubt. I have a feeling if Nichols was ever charged that he would ask for the trial to be moved to a different location. Even though it happened over 19 years ago I am sure there would still be very strong feelings there about it amongst people that are old enough to remember it. I saw one case where there was blood in the guy's house, he had the motive and the means and they actually arrested him and charged him and he was acquitted. The jurors said they thought he probably did do it but they had to acquitt him because there was simply too much doubt. So anything is possible.